Licorne 1755 by mtaylor - 3/16" scale - French Frigate - from Hahn plans - Version 2.0 - TERMINATED

[popeye the sailor]

sweet looking cannon Mark.......looking forward in seeing your modifications.

[mtaylor]

Thanks for the comments and the likes.

 

Well, reworking the cannons are out   I can't reliably jig them into any tool I have for turning without damaging them or the cannon suddenly rotating on the cascabel.   Oh well...  I have 12 of the 24 carriages (wood parts only) assemble.  Fiddly things and since the upper deck(s) guns are even smaller, I'm going to go with a different design.  Once all 24 are assembled, I'll add the hardware, blacken the barrels and install them.   Drilling for the eyebolts, making the training rig, etc. will follow.   For those keeping score, hull is pierced for 26 ports on the gundeck, but the French (as this point in time) left them unfilled for access to anchor cables, etc.   Also, there two are on the forward side of the stoves/kitchens and room to work them (and for recoil) is limited.  I'll post some progress photos once the carriages are assembled and also as I make them ready with all the hardware, etc.

 

 

[BANYAN]

A bit disappointing for you Mark, but I am sure they will still look OK

 

cheers

 

Pat

[popeye the sailor]

sorry to hear you can't do what you intended to do.   a different design........are you ordering more cannons?   good to hear your making progress...again,  I'll look forward to seeing what you've decided to do.

[Hubac's Historian]

I am sure you are frustrated by that, Mark.  In the grand scheme of things, though, these small differences won’t matter.

[shipmodel]

Hi Mark - 

 

AOL was acting up again and I wasn't getting my notifications.  Seems to be working now, and I got current with your build.  Very clean work, as usual.  Those guns will be nice, whether British pattern or French.  And it could be historically accurate as well.  As Steve noted, there was a lot of repurposing of cannon whenever an enemy ship was captured.

 

If you wanted to modify them, could you soft solder a rod into the barrel and turn that way?  Maybe rig some sort of live center to support the cascabel.  I have never done this, so I may be off base here.

 

Dan

[mtaylor]

Thanks for looking gentlemen.  I appreciate the likes and the comments.  

 

I've decided to live with the cannons as they are.  I did some further testing and still didn't like what I was getting as results.   Things were busy here and too late I realized I should have made several jigs as I decided (after some destructive testing) to use a thin epoxy that seemed to take forever to try.   I have 24 carriages assembled and pretty much cleaned up and parts for 5 more if I should royally mess some of the "good" ones up.  Now to convert the shop over to metal work as I need to blacken and install the fittings, do the rigging, and install.   Each gun will need 2 eyebolts on the carriage, 2 on the deck (for pulling the gun back from the port), and then 4 on the bulkhead at each port.  I'll be using Dafi's fine looking (and small) eyes and hooks for all this. My eyes are now crossed and I note that I've been mumbling to myself a lot the last day or two trying to get these finished.  Note that the two forward ports (1 on each side) will not be filled as these were "access ports" for lack of a better term.

 

Here's pics of the carriages in place for position and to run some checks.  Pierre is standing by for scale reference.  I'll pick the 10 best for the mid-ship area that's open and if any of the rest fail to met standards, I'll replace them with new ones.  Hopefully, in the next week or two, I'll also install all the furniture (oops.. need to make 2 "kitchens") and get rid of that blue tape.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[BANYAN]

They look great Mark; some production line you have going

 

cheers

 

Pat

[John Allen]

6 hours ago, mtaylor said:

get rid of that blue tape.

Mark,

 

First class. Carriages are primo.

 

You need to quit making feel stupid. Blue tape on the gratings well kiss my grits twice when building I have had line, eyes, rings and etc, fall down into the middle deck to where tweezers could not retrieve So get the vacuum and recover fittings and waste scrap, also sucked up cannon balls and a couple of ladders. I feel like all 3 of the 3 Stooges after your last post voila I to have blue tape, never occurred to me to cover gratings.

[src]

Mark, nicely done as always, although I think those blue tarps lashed down on deck are out of period???

As far as your epoxy drying, if you have an oven with a pilot light that will help with the cure time. A small incandescent bulb in a shoe box might work also. I know,I know, not environmentally friendly, but sometimes.....

 

Sam

[popeye the sailor]

the carriages look great Mark  very well done   

[mtaylor]

Thanks for the likes and comments.    Testing right now to find the right combination of bits and pieces.   

 

19 hours ago, BANYAN said:

They look great Mark; some production line you have going

 

cheers

 

Pat

Thanks Pat.  I'm finding that sometimes it's the only way.

 

13 hours ago, John Allen said:

Mark,

 

First class. Carriages are primo.

 

You need to quit making feel stupid. Blue tape on the gratings well kiss my grits twice when building I have had line, eyes, rings and etc, fall down into the middle deck to where tweezers could not retrieve So get the vacuum and recover fittings and waste scrap, also sucked up cannon balls and a couple of ladders. I feel like all 3 of the 3 Stooges after your last post voila I to have blue tape, never occurred to me to cover gratings.

I'm tickled to hear someone liked an idea.  After fishing out some parts I came to the conclusion there had to be a better way.  I find I do need to replace the tape as it doesn't like staying stuck in place for week or two at time.

 

53 minutes ago, src said:

Mark, nicely done as always, although I think those blue tarps lashed down on deck are out of period???

As far as your epoxy drying, if you have an oven with a pilot light that will help with the cure time. A small incandescent bulb in a shoe box might work also. I know,I know, not environmentally friendly, but sometimes.....

 

Sam

 

I thought of that, but the oven is out due to Admiral's prerogative.  I didn't think of the light bulb in a shoebox.  I'll try that next time.

 

 

[mikiek]

On 2/27/2018 at 6:24 PM, src said:

As far as your epoxy drying, if you have an oven with a pilot light that will help with the cure time. A small incandescent bulb in a shoe box might work also. I know,I know, not environmentally friendly, but sometimes.....

 

Sam

Mark - I have found that often when my epoxy doesn't dry well it's because I didn't mix it well. The guy that taught me to use epoxy would stir for at least a minute before using. The same guy would hold the container over a light bulb while stirring. He used orange juice containers cut in half. The ones with the metal bottoms. As Sam mentions heating it will speed up drying, Will just heats it before using instead of after. Of course you can't fool around much, you have to spread it quickly.  FWIW

 

The build is coming along very well.

[mtaylor]

Thanks for the info, Mike.  I'll retest.   Time is an issue as these bits and pieces aren't easy for me to move fast around.   The area that's critical is the cannon to the carriage and then the whole thing to the deck.  So... back to the laboratory to test.

[mtaylor]

Been a busy week in the shipyard.   Figuring out how the heck I'm going to do the cannons and I think I'm on target.   I've looked over the details from Boudriot's The Seventy-fFur Gun Ship  (see picture) and after going "Holy cow!!! How in the h*** am I going to do that?" I took a deep breath and began analyzing things.  I think I can pull this off but there's a few bits I'm going to cheat on... like the hooks on the single block at the rear of the gun.  I'll use Dafi's etched brass hooks for those.. the 2.2mm size.  The singles I have are tiny and in scale to my eye as are the doubles on the front (they're actually maybe a tinge to large.  I've dug out the eyebolts and rings and found I can make the forward hook that's in the bulkhead from an eyebolt.  I went through assorted stock and found some of Chuck's line that will work perfectly.  My apologies, I didn't toss a dime into the parts for size but if you go back up a few posts, you can see the carriages with a dime for size.   Oh... I do have more parts than what's shown in the box as those will get me started.

 

Well, the road to hell is paved with good intentions and I've got a few good intentions.   Hopefully my sanity will stay where it is.   I'll update when I get a few guns done and installed providing my eyes aren't crossed by then.  Time to gather the yard dogs up and set up a production line.

 

 

 

[Canute]

Mark, I've found that I can do a couple of steps, then have to go do something on a larger size for a while. Working in Z and N scales, I get part of a window or door done and I'm off on a more eyeball-friendly aspect of the build. Time to break out an Optivisor or strong drug-store reading glasses, too.

[BANYAN]

I reckon these will turn out quite well knowing you Mark; a few done each day will soon add up without too many headaches.  get those yarddogs busy then

 

cheers

 

Pat

[KeithAug]

13 hours ago, mtaylor said:

Figuring out how the heck I'm going to do the cannons and I think I'm on target

This should be interesting Mark. I'm looking forward to seeing how it turns out. Good luck and stay sane.

[Jim Lad]

Mark, I've somhow been missing your build log.  Those guns are looking very nice indeed.

 

John

[Piet]

Looks like you have a plan and some nice guidance drawings. That kinda stuff is the interesting part of scratch building and a lot of fun.

 

Cheers,

[Omega1234]

Hi Mark

 

At long last, I’ve finally caught up with your Build Log.  Boy, oh boy, I’m definitely not disappointed.  From the cannons (in spite of your issues with them), the carriages and the wonderful hull and deck...yep, she’s looking really spiffy!

 

Nicely done, Mark.

 

Cheers. 

 

Patrick

 

 

[Srodbro]

Mark:

Allow me to demonstrate my ignorance with a question ...

On the section drawing of the cannon rigging, there is an eyebolt and ring above the gunport on the ceiling. 

Any idea what the purpose of this was?

 

Your build looks great. I like the way the blackening of the guns turned out. 

[aviaamator]

Yeah... That's the beauty!

[Beef Wellington]

Really nice progress Mark, love the work on the cannons, should look really sharp when all finally assembled.  Oh, and Licorne is looking pretty good too.

[mtaylor]

Thanks for the support.   Been spending time re-blackening the barrels as they weren't black but looked like darkened bronze.  I'm happy with them now.  Also sorting out the production line... 6 guns at a time, prep the hardware, install it as much as possible off ship, install to ship and go to "next".   This will take some time but I'm shooting for consistency.  <fingers crossed>

 

4 hours ago, Srodbro said:

Mark:

Allow me to demonstrate my ignorance with a question ...

On the section drawing of the cannon rigging, there is an eyebolt and ring above the gunport on the ceiling. 

Any idea what the purpose of this was?

 

Your build looks great. I like the way the blackening of the guns turned out. 

Ah.. I see the eyebolt.  Note that this image is for a 74 with port lids as the frigates didn't have lids but bucklers fitted as needed.  That eyebolt in the overhead is for when the lid/buckler is closed and the gun secured.  Basically a rope would be fitted to the eyebolt and rope from it to the muzzle of the gun as the guns were "stored" with the muzzle raised as high as possible. 

[Cap'n Rat Fink]

Hey been gone awhile witch you. So it took a while catching up with your build. Looks great!!!

[mtaylor]

Thanks for following along, for the likes, and commentary...

 

Still fussing with cannon... I drilled the holes for the rings and hooks that fit to the bulkhead.  The first photo shows the machining jig and drilling tool.  All the barrels are in the carriages and the appropriate hardware added to them.  I also added the trunnion caps made from black paper soaked in CA. (Barely visible in the last photo).  The 2nd pic shows 6 in position to check alignment, etc.   So far... so good.   Now for the fun part... hooks, blocks, and rope for the training gear.  Once that's completed, I'll start adding the breeching and installing the hardware to the bulkhead and connecting everything up.   My only comment is "This stuff is tiny.  Next time, a bigger scale. Admiral permitting of course."  

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited March 14, 2018 by mtaylor

[Omega1234]

Beautiful stuff, Mark.  Quick question about the second photo, principally where you’ve drilled and the resultant cracked frames.  Are they going to be a drama, or would they be covered up with the planking?

 

Cheers. 

 

Patrick

[popeye the sailor]

lots of tedious drilling.........looking good so far Mark      hope all is well at home.......and agreed!........stay sane  

[paulsutcliffe]

Looking really good Mark, how did you make the windows on the galleries I must have missed that